Treasure Of The Atocha
by R. Duncan Mathewson IIIArchaeological Director Of The Search For The
Nuestra Senora de Atocha

Introduction

Mel Fisher was the leading force in the search for the treasure of
the 1622 galleons. His struggle to find the lost treasure has been a costly
one, both financially, and personally. But the search continues, this mound
of silver bars and coins are a small portion of what has been found.
Excavation of the motherload site is expected to continue for several years.

Marquesas Key's Florida, July
20, 1985:

“Put away the
charts! We found it!’’ Kane Fisher’s voice crackled out of the radio at the Key West office of Treasure Salvors, the salvage
company owned by his father1 Mel Fisher. The announce­ment set
off an instant, nearly riotous. celebration.

Kane Fisher
spoke from the deck of the Dauntless, a
salvage boat
which had been combing the ocean floor off Key West for the wreckage of a
Spanish galleon, Nuestra Senora de Atocha.
Today’s the day
that treasure Salvors I6-year search finally yields the solution to a
350-year-old mystery. The silver ingots---over 1,000 of them stacked like a
cord of wood-mark the resting place of the bulk of the cargo of the Atocha, which sank during a
hurricane in 1622.

During that 16
years, Mel Fisher often encouraged his divers by telling them, Today’s the
day” He even had the phrase printed on t-shirts And that hope kept them
going through times when there was no money
to pay their wages,
through the weary months between the
tantalizing finds of
a single silver ingot or a scrap of jewelry.

Ironically, today is
also the day, July 20, marking the tenth anniversary of the death of Mel’s oldest son, Dirk, Dirk’s wife, Angel, and crewman Rick Gage. The three drowned when the company’s salvage tug Northwind
capsized. three days before his death, Dirk had located a pile of bronze
cannons. Those cannons confirmed that the scattered artifacts the divers had
been finding for the past four years were part of the long-lost Atocha.

Now, a decade later, the fervent optimism of Mel Fisher, and the
skill of a dedicated band of archaeologists,
scientists, historians.

sailors, and divers had finally uncovered the scene of one of Spain’s most financially disastrous
maritime accidents.

The hurricane that wrecked the Atochawas no more fierce than the forces spawned by Fisher’s
monomanical search.

In addition
to the loss of lives, the search
consumed 58 million
dollars-profits from Fisher’s earlier salvage of a fleet of galleons sunk in 1715 plus the funds of hundreds of investors.

In the treasure business,
success can be more difficult than failure. During the 16 year search Fisher
had to wage battle in court with the United States Federal Government Land
the State of Florida for ownership of the
Atocha‘s great wealth.

In ruling against the United
States and for Treasure Salvors in March 1978, Judge Walter P. Gewin of the
U.S. Court of Appeals wrote:

“This action evokes all the
romance and danger of the buccaneering days in the West Indies. It is routed
in an ancient tragedy of Imperial Spain, and embraces a modern tragedy as
well. The case also represents the story of triumph, a story in which the
daring and determination of the colonial settlers are mirrored by
contemporary treasure seekers.”

Judge Gewins’ ruling hints at the
adventure of treasure hunting treasure is an almost universal human dream.
While the stories of pirates that inspire the wistful longing for the bright
gleam of gold chains, the dull lustre of fine silver, and the brilliance of
a well crafted emerald may be fiction, they have a firm foundation in fact.

For most of us, those
stories remain dreams. But not for Mel Fisher, and not for the people who
are Treasure Salvors, Inc. They fought the sea, the government, even
modern day pirates, to recover the wealth of the Atocha In their search, they
adapted every useful instrument of modern technology, following through with
sweat in a dogged physical struggle with the capricious ocean. In the
salvage of the Atocha,
for the first time, the work of commercial salvors
was guided by a team of historians and archaeologists. Despite the
disparagement of other professional archaeologists who claimed the
archaeological work done on the Atochawas useless because it was carried out by a
commercial salvage company, the innovations and knowledge gained in the
operation proved conclusively that shallow water shipwrecks in the New World
could be uncovered with the same meticulous attention to detail exercised on
-sites on dry land. With details patiently pieced together from the rotted
timbers and crushed jewelry and information gained from worm eaten
documents, the divers, historians, and archaeologists were able to add
enormously to what is known about Spain’s New World Colonies in the 17th
century.

What follows is the story of an
extraordinary group of men and women who followed their dream of locating
underwater riches and succeeded where the power of Imperial Spain, Dutch
warships, and English pirates failed.